Take a moment of your time- a minute would be fine, perhaps even two- to imagine this: A man, with no one but the moon for company, is walking on a road. He is starving, tired, and has no idea where he is going. The night has come, the stars sing in the sky, but he doesn't listen. No, no, all he can think about is his intense hunger and where he might find something to eat.

Suddenly, the man stops short, foot freezing in mid-step. He cautiously takes a breath through his nose, wondering if what he senses is really there and not an illusion. Could it be? He sniffs the air again. Yes! It's true! It's there, he can smell it- food!

Now, think about how happy the man is- no, scratch that. He's thrilled, ecstatic, almost sobbing with joy at the prospect of eating again. He begins to run at full speed, not caring that his feet are sore and his muscles feel as if they are on fire. All that matters is that he gets some food, and fast.

The man runs and runs. He can feel blisters forming on the bottom of his feet, but he doesn't stop. The temptation of eating is too strong to care about the pain. He notices, with rising hope, that the smell of food is getting stronger. Just a little bit more- almost there-!

Then, as quickly as it rose, his hope comes crashing down again. The man skids to a stop, jaw dropping, eyes refusing to believe what they see... or rather, what they don't  see.

There is no food.  He has reached the end of the road. There is nothing to eat there- no fruit, no meat, no bread, not even a jug of water to quench his thirst. Just... Darkness. An end full of nothing.

Why...?

That, dear readers, is exactly how Kahi felt when she returned to HQ. She was the starving man, the food was the lead on the mockingbirds, and the part of the road where the man stopped walking was where she was beginning to lose hope, too.

Kahi sighed. It was nearing four in the afternoon, a good six hours after she had left for the trafficker's boat. But truth be told, it felt like it had been longer than six hours. It had been a tiring day- the search had dragged on for quite a bit, even with a team of police officers working around her. Plus, when they'd finished looking though everything that they possibly could, there was still more work that needed to be done (although, to be fair, it wasn't even work for her. It was the forensics division that had to complete the next task). They couldn't just leave the boat, after all, not with the blood stains on the carpet, the broken safe with cash, and the dead body of-

"Kahi. You'll get wrinkles from frowning so much."

A new voice shook the lady agent out of her thoughts. Instinctively, she tensed up in her seat (self-defence lesson number one: always be prepared in the case of a sudden attack), and raised her eyes to see who had joined her in the room. She relaxed a tiny bit, though, when she saw who it was. The scowl on her face made no attempt to hide itself, however.

"Youngjae. I don't think it's possible for anyone to go through what I did today and not  frown," Kahi said, doing her best not to bite the man's head off.

"Fair enough." The intelligence agent pushed up his glasses as he spoke. "Feel free to glare and gripe all you want. Just don't expect me to take responsibility. Anyway, I should congratulate you on your work this morning. I heard the search was a smooth success."

Kahi looked at him in disbelief. "A success?  You consider it to be a success?  Do you really think we managed to accomplish our goal? Everything was a complete mess, Youngjae. We uncovered some things, yes, but they were all useless. We're nowhere near to finding our killer than we were in the beginning."

Shrugging, Youngjae replied, "You found your trafficker, didn't you? He may have been dead, but he was there. And you might have evidence that he was the one who smuggled in the mockingbirds. At least now the game of hide-and-seek with the birds will come to an end."

The exhausted lady reflected on his words as she, for what seemed like the millionth time, thought back to what had happened during the search.

"Now, remember," the leader of the police squad (what was his name again? Dongho? Dongjoon? One of those two) grinned at Kahi. He slipped a protective visor over his face and fastened the straps. "Seeing as this is the hideout of a drug and who-knows-what-else dealer, things may get out of hand. Don't forget that we're in- excuse the pun- dangerous waters here. You'd be surprised at how quickly a simple conversation can turn into a violent shooting spree. But not to worry. I'll make sure everything goes as planned, or my name isn't Lee Donghae."

''Right, his name is Donghae... Close enough.' Kahi narrowed her eyes at Amber's police friend. Who did he think he was, to look down on her like that? "I know, officer. Might I remind you that I've been working in the crime scene business for more than ten years. At this point, I'm quite sure I have an idea of how criminal investigations work."

Unfazed by her frosty tone, Donghae flashed his pearly whites at Kahi once again. "And I have no doubt about that, ma'am. I just wouldn't want anything happening to a pretty lady like yourself."

Kahi had to stop herself from rolling her eyes. "Let's go," she said instead, making her way towards the harbour. The other officers were already waiting for them in front of the trafficker's boat. Kahi and the squad leader had been the last ones to leave the car. "The boat won't search itself, you know."

Once they had joined the rest of the group, Kahi immediately addressed her uniformed companions. "I appreciate you letting me join in today," she began, sneaking a peak at the boat. At first glance, it didn't look like anything special. It had a medium build, roughly twice the size larger than a motor boat, but smaller- way smaller- than a Caribbean cruise ship. Hmm... It looked ideal for travelling on water without drawing too much attention. And it was white. Just plain white. How inconspicuous of the owner.

The agent focused her attention back on the group. She continued, "This is a huge favour you're doing for me, especially since I'm not properly licensed as a police officer. Thank you. But now that we've arrived at the place of the search, there's something else I'd like you to do, as well.

"If there's anything you find on the boat that looks suspicious, call me over at once," she said crisply. "You've most likely heard of the serial killer we've been trying to catch these days. So far, there hasn't been any luck. This is due to the fact that we have virtually no evidence to work with. So if there's something which you think could help us solve our case, let me be the first to know."

Kahi nodded at Donghae to take over. The squad leader nodded back at her, bangs flopping over his twinkling eyes.

"You heard the crime scene agent," he told his team. They had only just met, but already he reminded Kahi of a certain annoying, loud-mouthed agent at HQ: Nam Woohyun. Both Donghae and Woohyun appeared to be obnoxious wise-guys with bad taste in jokes, but they could actually turn serious when the time called for it. "Now, let's get cracking! Get a move on, soldiers! It's time to have a chat with our friend on board."

Donghae began walking up the plank, motioning for the others to follow. Kahi was right behind him. As she stepped closer and closer towards the boat, she could feel her heartbeat start to accelerate.

This was it. This was the place. This was where she could- maybe, just maybe- find the answer to the frustrating and elusive mockingbird puzzle.

When they had all climbed aboard the ship's empty deck, Donghae marched purposefully towards the cabin.

"Open up!" he yelled, banging on the door. "This is the police! We have a warrant to search this boat!" He waited for a couple of minutes, but there was no answer.

"I repeat, this is the police! We're here on official business! If you don't open up in the next minute, we have no choice but to enter by force!"

Kahi counted the minute down in her head. Sixty... Fifty-nine... Fifty-eight... It seemed to go on forever, with all of the tension in the air. Fifty-seven... Fifty-six... Fifty-five...

When she finally made it to the awaiting zero, Donghae let out a low, grim noise. "By force it is." He motioned for a few officers behind to join him at the door. "Eunhyuk and Sungmin, you guys know how to pick locks, right? We could break the door down, but I'm pretty sure the warrant doesn't cover the right to damage property. Be careful; we don't have much time. The security on the handle doesn't look too strong, but seeing as this is a black market man we're dealing with, we shouldn't underestimate-"

Click.

"Or we can just turn the doorknob," the one called Eunhyuk said amusedly. While Donghae had been rambling on about door locks and whatnot, Eunhyuk had stepped up and twisted the handle. The door swung open in a surprisingly easy manner... Perhaps a bit  too easy, Kahi thought, but she wasn't about to complain.

Eunhyuk swept his arm forwards in a grand motion. "After you," he said, smirking at Donghae. Muttering, the squad leader pointedly ignored his subordinate and strode past him. Silently, Kahi stared after him for a moment before gazing inside the cabin. As she observed the interior from the doorway, a frown etched itself on her face.

Something wasn't right. At least to her, that's what it seemed like. An uneasy feeling rose in Kahi's chest. There were no lights on inside, and the window blinds had been shut as well, so she couldn't quite see past the shadows of the room... But... There was just something  off about the whole scene. Something wrong. Something unsettling.

"Hello?" Donghae walked over to the light switch and flipped it on. As florescent lights flickered to life overhead, he blinked a few times to adjust to the sudden brightness. "Is anybody home?"

Kahi, too, took a better look at her surroundings. To her surprise, it was bigger and more spacious than she had thought it would be. An empty table stood a few feet away from her, and to her left, a hallway led to what she assumed would be more rooms. Everything was tidy and neatly in place, as if the owner had a personal maid to clean his messes.

It didn't look like the hideout of an illegal trafficker.

"Are you sure this is the right boat, Chief?" one of the officers asked sceptically, voicing Kahi's thoughts.

"Yes, I'm sure," Donghae called over his shoulder. He had moved further down the hallway, and was now opening all of the room doors. "But if you have a complaint, tell that to Leeteuk. He's the one who gave me the map this morning- What the hell?!"

Snapping to attention, Kahi quickly looked over to see what had caused Donghae's yelp. He was standing close to the end of the hallway, where the third last room to the right was. As with the other rooms, the squad leader had pulled the door open and was staring inside... Except for this one, he wore an unmistakable expression of shock and disbelief.

"What? What did you find in there?" The agent strode towards the stunned policeman. He didn't even look away from the scene before him as he gestured ahead, pulling the door further away so she could take a peek.

"Now we know why he didn't answer when we knocked on the door."

Kahi swept her gaze inside the room. Almost immediately, she caught scent of a musty and unpleasant odour. It had a metallic tinge to it, almost like how rusted iron would smell if it were liquid. The woman grimaced slightly and took a step forwards. This smell... Kahi knew this scent. At least, she had an idea of what it was coming from. It was a grim odour which all CSI agents were familiar with, whether they liked it or not. 

Her suspicions were confirmed once she got a better view of the room. There was a bathroom, a sink, and a rack with towels folded over it... This was obviously the cabin bathroom. There was a soap bottle on the counter and a pair of slippers beside the sink- but Kahi wasn't looking at those. She was staring at what was next to it, the thing that had made Donghae exclaim in surprise.

It was the bathtub- or more specifically, it was what was  in the bathtub. From where she was standing, she could see a dark mass of  something dumped inside of it. There was water gathered in the tub about two-thirds of the way, so the object was wet, but she was pretty certain she knew what it was.

A missing boat owner. A metallic scent. Not to mention the contents of the tub looked murky, so it couldn't simply be water in there... Yup, she knew what it was, alright.

The body of the dead trafficker lay unmoving in his bathtub, surrounded by a pool of his own blood.

Kahi sighed. She reached up to rub her aching temples, wondering if she had an extra aspirin tablet somewhere in her cubicle. "I suppose you're right. It could have been worse."

"Hmph. I'm always right," Youngjae sniffed. He watched as his companion leaned over to open the top drawer of her desk. "Now, if you're done with moping about your day, tell me what happened after you found the corpse. I read the report the police team sent us, but I'd like to hear it from your perspective."

"The body was the biggest thing we found," Kahi answered. She was still searching for her medication. "Figuratively speaking. After we called the forensics team, we split up and searched the rest of the cabin. It was surprisingly neat for a murder scene. Nothing else was out of place, except for what we believe the trafficker used as his room."

She glanced at the bespectacled agent. "It looked like a warzone. Furniture was upturned, clothes were strewn all over the floor, and his laptop was partially destroyed. The analysis team is attempting to retrieve the software data as we speak. We also discovered some blood stains on his bed, so we assumed that was where this man was killed. It's yet to be confirm, but I'm 99% sure he's the trafficker.

"He had a safe hidden in his closet," Kahi went on. "A mini vault to keep his valuables in. It was one of the first things we found in his room, primarily because it wasn't  hidden in his closet."

Youngjae nodded. "Most likely the murderer dragged it out, correct? I read that part. The lock was smashed and the handle had been forced open."

"That's right." Once again, Kahi felt a frown appear on her face. Only this time, it wasn't out of frustration and tiredness from her day- it was a look of bemusement and genuine perplexity. "It seemed the man kept his money from his deals in there. We found an extremely large sum of cash in the safe, which was odd. Not a dollar bill appeared to be missing. The money was there. There were no other security measures to overcome. Why didn't the killer just take it?"

The intelligence agent mirrored Kahi's expression. Furrowing his brows, he said, "Looking at that fact, you can rule out the motive of gaining riches. If the killer left all of the cash in the safe, then it wasn't money he was after."

Kahi gave a grim nod. "There's something else he was after, something he could only get after killing the man on his boat. Perhaps it was information about his trafficking deals. I couldn't find his phone anywhere, and there were no traces of business documents to be seen..." Closing her eyes, she released another deep, exhausted sigh.

"Like we aren't busy enough with the Mockingbird case... Now we have another murder on our hands! Do you realize how much extra work we'll have to do to cover this one, as well?"

"It's not all that bad, you know."

The female agent was too worn-out to see who the new arrival was. Besides, she didn't really have to. With his baritone voice and quick-moving footsteps, she could easily tell who it was that had decided to join Youngjae and herself.

"Easy for you to say, Chanyeol." Kahi gave up looking for her medicine. It wasn't there- she had probably eaten it at some other time she'd gotten a migraine. "You're not the one who has to work on this new case now."

Chanyeol shook his head. Eyes as bright as a kid's in a candy store, he seemed to be bursting with news of some sort. "That's not it," he said impatiently, throwing in a hasty greeting to Youngjae. "This isn't a new case, Kahi. It really isn't. Amazingly enough, this murder is connected to the one with the Mockingbird."

Kahi stared at him. In the tone she used to deal with drunken witnesses and men who hit on her one too many times, she uttered a single word. "Explain."

The lanky agent ignored her steely tone. "I was just down at the analysis lab," Chanyeol told them excitedly. As he spoke, his words become more rushed and the look in his eyes more animated, like he had  to tell them his story or else he would explode. "You know they took the laptop so they could retrieve some data, right? Well, they did it."

"Already?" Youngjae sounded- grudgingly- impressed. "A task like that should have taken longer. How did they manage to finish so quickly?"

Chanyeol shrugged. He wasn't a computer person; hacking processes and software retrieval didn't interest him too much. "Actually, they didn't get all  of the data. Only about 20% of it. But that 20% is what matters."

Kahi clucked her tongue. "Will you be telling us sometime today what was in that software?" she all but snapped. Sometimes, she wished Chanyeol wouldn't talk so much. He was a great partner, really, but he had an annoying habit of what they called beating around the bush. And they were crime scene agents. They couldn't afford to waste time talking in such a roundabout way.

The chatty agent, however, dismissed her tone again. Insults rolled off of his back like raindrops on a duck. "Relax, I'm getting there," he grinned. "That 20% is what matters to you. It's evidence that the man is the one who trafficked the mockingbirds here."

"... Are you sure?" Kahi asked quietly. She felt a spark of hope light up within her, but she defused it almost immediately. Here was the scent of more food for the starving man...

Nodding, Chanyeol answered, "I can't remember exactly what the lab said, but there were records of the deals he made. To our pleasant surprise, a transport of mimus polyglottos  was one of them. The lab report will have the exact details in it.

"That's not all," he continued, eyes gleaming. "We took a look in his safe again. There wasn't just money in there- he had hard copies of his business deals. They were like contracts or something. Anyway, those documents were hidden at the very bottom of the safe, under a false attachment. And get this: the papers were all messed up, like somebody had recently rushed looking through them. You know what that means?"

"The killer was searching for something," Youngjae realized aloud, "And he found it. At least, we can assume that's what happened."

"You got it, pal." Chanyeol grinned. "The analysis people tried matching those papers to the files they found on the laptop. All of them were accounted for, except for one single document which we think the killer took. Any guesses as to which trafficking deal that one was for?"

"The mockingbirds," Kahi breathed. Chanyeol nodded again.

"That's right. The mockingbirds."

All three agents fell silent for a moment. Kahi didn't even dare to breath. Was it true? She could hardly believe it- a new lead! Finally, something she could use to track down the Mockingbird killer. Yes, the dealer was dead, and the document had been stolen as well, but at least she had some evidence.

"Were the analysis people able to open that file on the laptop?" Kahi asked. She felt more hope rising up inside of her, but this time, she allowed it to stay. "If we have that, we can track down the person who made the deal for the birds."

Chanyeol's tone was regrettable. "No, we can't. They managed to open the file on another computer, but the name's not there. Apparently, the trafficker let his clients write down 'anonymous' as their name. That's what we found on the dotted line of this document."

"It makes sense," Youngjae murmured. "In the illegal trading world, privacy of one's self is a thing best kept a secret."

More silence. A minute passed (or maybe two, perhaps even three) before Chanyeol opened his mouth to speak. Kahi beat him to it, however, when she turned to Youngjae with a new glint in her eyes.

"The trafficker. How long will it take you to find information on him?"

"Do you mean, how long did it take?" The intelligence agent's voice was smug. He raised up his arm to show her a folder he'd been holding onto. Kahi hadn't even realized Youngjae had had that with him. "I already drew up a file on the dealer. That's the reason why I came here in the first place. It's not complete, but it's enough for you to get started on your investigation."

He flipped through the papers inside. "His name was Kwon Jiyong. Thirty-four years old, living alone, and a permanent South Korean citizen. He was involved in the trafficking business for about seventeen years, but there wasn't much data I could find about him. This man was a dealer who knew how to hide his work."

Kahi took the folder from him. Youngjae had somehow managed to find a picture of the elusive trafficker, and placed it at the very top of the file. Kwon Jiyong stared up at Kahi from the paper. She studied the photo carefully, trying to picture in her mind what he would have looked like as a living person.

'Flashy red hair, a sly smirk, and eyes that look as if they're calculating your every move...'  If there was a dictionary image of a con artist, Kahi felt that this Kwon Jiyong would be it. For a fleeting second, she wondered if he had been born in the year of the snake. Those people were particularly good at deceiving others. She looked down at the picture for a few more minutes before bringing herself back to the conversation with the other two.

"Did forensics figure out the cause of death yet?" Chanyeol was asking. Youngjae nodded at the file currently in Kahi's hands.

"They've only just started the autopsy now. However, since they managed to draw some conclusions from the on-scene examination, I've included those basic facts in his profile." Youngjae crossed his arms. "The team who was called to the crime scene made a rough estimate of the time and cause of his death. They believe he died sometime two or three days ago- the fact that he was decomposing in a tub full of water made it difficult to draw a more accurate guess. Bullet wounds were also found on his chest. That's most likely how he was killed."

"Two to three days... So it hasn't been that long since the murderer got to him," Chanyeol mused. He glanced briefly at his companions: Kahi, who was still reading the file to herself silently, and Youngjae, who was frowning at it over her shoulder. "Doesn't that kind of creep you out? It's almost like he knew we were onto him. Like the Mockingbird killer was playing one step ahead of us."

"I know." Kahi lifted her gaze to meet Chanyeol's. was set in a grim line. "That's what frightens me the most."